


In Good Hands

by SingManyFaces



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Season 3 Episode 20: Citadel Rescue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26840077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SingManyFaces/pseuds/SingManyFaces
Summary: After the events at the Citadel Ahsoka can’t sleep, and accidentally listens in on a private conversation between her masters.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 16
Kudos: 257





	In Good Hands

Ahsoka sat braced against the corner formed by the wall and her bunk, drumming the fingers of one hand nervously against the mattress. Fatigue soaked deep into her muscles after the Citadel but she couldn’t sleep, still too wired from the day’s events, the classified information buzzing on loop around her mind; hyper-aware in that state, she picked up the sound of her masters approaching long before the door opened. The anxiety she’d felt about her lie since Master Piel’s death twisted sharply in her stomach—she didn’t think she could bear more questioning just then, so she hurriedly scrunched down onto the bed and pulled the sheet over her head, leaving only the smallest opening for her to see out of.

The door slid open with a gentle hiss. Obi-Wan was in the middle of his suggestion, “...you can always ask Master Plo when we get back to—oh.” His steps halted with his words, and then his voice lowered. “It would seem your padawan is already asleep.”

“Good.” Even from her view, Ahsoka could see Obi-Wan arch a brow at Anakin; Anakin shrugged his left shoulder as his voice softened. “Whether or not she really was supposed to be here, she’s more than earned her rest.”

The older man breathed a sigh of relief. “She’s not the only one.” He stepped into Anakin’s space then, fit a careful hand to the curve of his right shoulder. Anakin sucked in a breath, barely stifling a pained sound. “It’s not dislocated, is it?”

Logic said it couldn’t have been, Ahsoka knew; Anakin had held his own too well through all of the attacks during the escape for it to have been. But she also knew that her master had defied logic before.

Anakin brushed off the question, trying to make his tone light. “I fixed it on the landing.”

Catching her lip in her teeth to keep herself quiet, Ahsoka remembered when the electromagnet had cut out, watching—feeling—how hard her master had hit the floor.

With a not _quite_ disapproving hum, “And have been using the Force to ignore the pain since.”

“I couldn’t let myself slow us down,” Anakin defended the choice, his presence in the Force matching his tone.

Obi-Wan nodded understandingly, “Yes, I’d have done the same.” Drifting back, Obi-Wan claimed the chair tucked under its desk—standard in all the officers’ quarters—and dragged it to rest in front of Anakin. His voice was quiet and, more than that, gentle. “But you can let go now.”

The younger man let out a breath, and it was almost as though his ability to stand left him with it as he collapsed into the proffered chair. Fully feeling the pain in his shoulder for the first time in hours, his breathing came harsh and shallow. 

“Oh, Anakin...” Immediately Obi-Wan began opening his bracers and, once he’d set them aside, peeling out of his gloves.

The pain had already broken out a thin sheen of sweat on Anakin’s skin, but that didn’t stop him from making the comment, “I can’t remember the last time I saw you take your gloves off.”

He managed to sound conversational, “I could say the same of you.”

That familiar defensiveness spiked in the Force again; from her angle Ahsoka could clearly see Anakin, and the way he stilled. “That’s not—” Anakin’s argument faded to nothing, though, as Obi-Wan leaned over him to work at his belt and, once he’d opened that, ease the tabards from his shoulders before turning to his outer tunic. “Master...?” The confusion was obvious in his voice, and Ahsoka burrowed a little deeper into her bedding when his gaze slanted toward her bunk.

Obi-Wan paused only a moment, huffing a laugh as Anakin’s outer tunic joined his tabards. “I want to help you.” He caught the hem of Anakin’s thinner undershirt and began to pull it slowly upward. “Brace yourself.” Even with the warning Anakin sucked in another harsh breath as Obi-Wan worked the damp shirt free of him. He tossed that as well, before circling behind Anakin, “You know it works better skin to skin.”

Ahsoka could feel the pull in the Force, the way the older master drew it to himself—from himself—and concentrated it to his hands before laying them carefully against Anakin’s shoulder. The strain in Anakin’s features began to ease as Obi-Wan’s hands smoothed over the aching joint. The smallest smile curved his mouth. “Remind me to thank Master Bant for teaching you this,” a grateful laugh turned into a soft gasp as Obi-Wan began to kneed at the abused muscle, “Again.”

Chuckling, “I’m sure she’d appreciate another fruit basket.”

For a few moments there was relative quiet as the master focused on his work: the soothing slide of skin against skin, Anakin’s breathing growing less labored as the jagged tracks of his most recent electrical burns faded. His posture grew more loose with the aid of Obi-Wan’s treatment, his head listing to the side to give the other man better access; even Ahsoka felt herself beginning to relax a bit in the lightened atmosphere. Then Obi-Wan picked up the thread, “As I was saying, you can always ask Master Plo once we’ve reached the temple, but I think you should go a little easier on Ahsoka.”

“I gave her an order, Obi-Wan.” His earlier annoyance was gone; Anakin just sounded tired now as he repeated his argument, leaning forward to lay his forearms across his knees. “She deliberately disobeyed me.”

“Oh yes,” Obi-Wan agreed wryly, pressing his thumbs into knotted muscle, “I can’t imagine what that’s like.”

“Master—” The single word was spoken so exasperatedly, but before he could say more he gave a startled groan as Obi-Wan bore down a little harder.

Obi-Wan sighed, “I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating—sometimes I don’t think you realize how similar you two have become.”

“Or maybe I do.” Beneath her sheet, Ahsoka slid her arms around herself as she watched Anakin’s gaze shift to his right arm, his hand closing over his still-gloved wrist. “And that’s why I’m trying to protect her.”

The knot in Ahsoka’s stomach twisted again. Her master didn’t always explain the thinking behind his orders—or explain it _fully_ , even when he did; he always just seemed unnecessarily protective. But she remembered Obi-Wan coming to her—it seemed so long ago now—after the mission to retrieve the stolen holocron, how he’d told her about when he had watched Anakin rush after Count Dooku the way that she had rushed after Cad Bane. Both so eager, both ending up paying for that eagerness. 

Anakin had seemed so calm as he’d dealt with Cad Bane then, but she had felt his desperate worry for her in the Force. Had he gotten better at hiding it? Or had she begun ignoring it?

She was drawn from her guilty wondering by Obi-Wan’s voice. “I understand your worries, Anakin, I do,” he continued; Anakin’s head drooped forward as Obi-Wan shifted to knead just below the nape of his neck. “How many times did I try to leave you behind when I was given a mission, fearing the dangers of it for you?” Almost to himself, then, “None of them were anything like what we’re dealing with now...”

A noncommittal noise came from Anakin.

“And how many of those did _you_ find your way onto?” he asked, “When you were certain you belonged there with me.”

Anakin shook his head, lifted it just enough that she could see him roll his eyes, “It’s not the same, Obi-Wan.”

“I’m sure she’d disagree with you,” the older master pointed out. “And whether you like it or not,” he reasoned, “there was more than one part of this mission that would’ve gone very differently if she hadn’t been there—if they’d gone at all.”

“I know that!” He straightened then, the motion as abrupt as the words that preceded it, and made a sharp, pained sound as it jerked his shoulder. 

Hands still gentle, Obi-Wan eased him forward again, murmured, “Let me take care of it...”

The younger man didn’t give any protest, drew several shuddering breaths instead. When he spoke again he was calmer, voice softer. “I know she’s strong, and capable.” Another deep breath, and he released it as a sigh. “I don’t want to hold her back. But the difference is in what you said before.” His broad frame wilted in as Obi-Wan’s hands moved over his shoulder and back, working away at the stubborn soreness. 

And that was when Ahsoka could feel it again—that familiar swell in the Force around her master. That worry that said so clearly, even when the actual words weren’t spoken, _‘I can’t let you die;’_ she took a shaky breath of her own as it washed over her, unignorably. “We’re not exploring anymore, or,” still draped over his knee, he waved his left hand in a small, vague circle, “helping with diplomatic negotiations.” His voice took on a restless tone, frustrated with the situation. “We’re out on battlefields—willingly walking into death traps! And she’s so focused on the moment she’s in right now...” She wouldn’t say that his voice sounded defeated as she closed the gap in her sheet, her master never sounded defeated. But he did sound lost in a way that she rarely heard from him; it was the voice she’d heard in the quiet of the medbay, when he’d thought she was asleep. “I just want her to see beyond the moment and into the bigger picture, and to _trust_ me,” he murmured, breath hitching when Obi-Wan’s hands pressed harder again, “Trust that I know how to take care of her, like I trust you to know—”

It was all Ahsoka could do to stop herself from yanking down her sheet at the noise Anakin made, a sound caught somewhere between a startled shout and a gasp.

There was surprise—but also relief—rolling into the Force, then. Carefully, Ahsoka shifted the sheet enough to peek out from under it again. Anakin had sagged forward over his knees, panting from whatever Obi-Wan had done. Obi-Wan’s hand didn’t leave Anakin’s skin, fingers skimming along the expanse of his shoulders as he circled around in front of him again. They caught under Anakin’s chin to tilt it up, his voice low and warm. “I know how to take care of you,” he completed. 

Despite the interrupted conversation, a look of such uncomplicated happiness, affection, softened Anakin’s features. “Master...”

Ahsoka felt her skin flush hot and pulled the sheet closed again, working her head under her pillow for good measure. Their conversation had given her a lot to think on and...well, she had intruded enough for one day. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! You can find me on tumblr @singmanyfaces if you want to drop by. :D


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